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In my religion it is taught that the soul is the physical body and spirit together. The spirit is what makes the physical body alive and it's where your personality, feelings, emotions, etc. are. So yes, I believe that animals have spirits, because they have personalities that all their own and they have life.


I believe what sets humans apart from animals is that we were given a higher intelligence and we were given dominion over the animals of the earth.

This was my understanding as well, but I want to know for sure if there is Biblical support for this belief.


Can you cite the verse? It sounds like to me that "all of creation" could be referring to more than just living organisms, and the term "restored" likely doesn't have anything to do with eternal souls moving on to an afterlife.

To me, it doesn't really make sense if animals had souls. How would it be determined then which afterlife they go to? Heaven or someplace else? If they all just go to heaven, then why do they get a free pass while humans are stuck having to figure out the right religion and work on repenting their whole lives to make sure they get in? What would be the justification for this?

Can you cite the verse? It sounds like to me that "all of creation" could be referring to more than just living organisms, and the term "restored" likely doesn't have anything to do with eternal souls moving on to an afterlife.

To me, it doesn't really make sense if animals had souls. How would it be determined then which afterlife they go to? Heaven or someplace else? If they all just go to heaven, then why do they get a free pass while humans are stuck having to figure out the right religion and work on repenting their whole lives to make sure they get in?
Refers to animals in Heaven: http://www.answers2prayer.org/bible_questions/Answers/animals/pets.html
And the actual verse (though the site has more, and the verses refer more specifically to animals):"The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God." (Romans 8:19-21)

Verses specifically about animals:
2. God's Relation with Animals

A. God's Covenants with Animals

"I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you-the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you-every living creature on earth." (Genesis 9:9-10)

"In that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and the creatures that move along the ground. Bow and sword and battle I will abolish from the land, so that all may lie down in safety." (Hosea 2:1 cool

B. God's Concern for Animals

"And of every living thing, of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you." (Genesis 6:19)

"Six days you shall do your work, but on the seventh day you shall rest, so that your ox and your donkey may have relief." (Exodus 23:12; cf. Deuteronomy 5:14)

"You shall not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." (Deuteronomy 25:4)

"Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten in God's sight." (Luke 12:6; cf. Matthew 10:29)

C. God's Promise to Animals

"The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the hole of the cobra, and the young child put his hand into the viper's nest. They will neither harm nor destroy on my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." (Isaiah 11:6-9)

Perhaps they already know what we do not. Have you ever seen an animal in a midlife crisis? They defend their lives when they are to be cut short abruptly, but they also know that they will die, and that they will move on to better. They don't worry about things that we do because, in their simpler way, they understand things we over complicate.

Well, I learned of something.
If there is a religion with something partly wrong with your beliefs, there is a branch.
With Christianity, if you are into such but believe animals and all the organic goodness have souls, than there is also a branch for that.

----I am not christian but I have read all 66 books of bible and do belive within it's 32,000 verses is recurrently mentioned non-human souls... I have some example passages I use to argue this point-of-view with my peers...
----Some scholars have suggested that the classic translation of Nephesh Chayah "Living Creatures" occuring in Genesis multiple times would be better translated as "Living Soul", which is use to describe man in Genesis 2:7.
----In Numbers 16:22 God is god of the spirits of "All Flesh"
----Ecclesiastes 3:19-21
----Ecclesiastes 12:7
----Acts 17:25
----Revelations 16:3
----If I sound like I'm preaching or something like that I apologise, I'm just justifying my oppinon...